Hey, do you like blackouts?

Yeah, I love them.

What if they didn't exist?

Oh, I thought, is this an ad about curtains?

No, it's about perhaps the game not being on in your region and you not having access to it. Oh, that?

I hate that.

You hate that?

Yeah. Sorry, now that I understand the subject.

Well, if I were you, I would grab your exclusive NordVPN deal by going to nordvpn. Com/dangle, get a huge discount off your NordVPN plan because you'll never have to be blacked out NordVPN. It's a NordVPN plan plus four months for free, completely risk-free with Nord's 30-day money-back guarantee, Steve. Wow. Now, Jesse. Yes. You haven't given your opinion on blackouts. Are you pro or anti-blackout?

I'm anti-blackout, but I think NordVPN is more useful for the security features that it provides.

Are you talking about the encryption? Yes. Are we talking about the privacy and the fact that NordVPN keeps your information encrypted so you never have to worry about your IP or your location getting It's locked. It's locked. That's right. Nordvpn did a national privacy test, and the reports are pretty incredible. So listen, if you want to get involved, if you want to get it for yourself, nordvpn. Com/dangle. How do you spell dangle?

D-a-n-g-l-e.

Huge discount off your NordVPN plan, plus four additional months for free, completely risk-free with Nord's 30-day money back guarantee.Wow.I screwed that up. But you got it. Thank you. Let's start the show.

The Steve Dangle podcast with your host, Steve Dangle, Adam Wilde, and Jesse Blake.

Drinking out of a CJ Show mug after watching the CJ Show from Florida. Whoa. Stick taps to CJ for standing there. The thing was, he was standing there in the heat in Florida with his TSN nice jacket on. A jacket. Yeah, like a blazer. A handsome boy jacket. In the blazing heat. He could have just taken it off, but he didn't. It completed the look.

While Pierre Lebrun snaps paparazzi photos of him.

Yes, exactly. Exactly. I was really impressed with the setup.

Pierre, do some real journalism and go find Kate and what's going on there?

Here, Matty, if you want to bring this up here, there's CJ recording The CJ Show. What a haughty. In Florida. Look at that guy. He's so freaking handsome. Yeah. Doing a great job.

Every time I see CJ, I'm like, he's so handsome.

I forget sometimes that the first time we had CJ on the show, It would have been 2015, 2016, a long time ago. He didn't have a beard.

He did not. That was the episode we had Doug Sifu on, I believe.

Oh, yes. Cj had to leave because Doug Sifu was going to be on. That was wild. Anyway, hey, we're also recording some SDP VIP content. If you haven't signed up, it's an extra episode. It's all the stuff that we used to get to within the episode that we can't now because it's all hockey, wall to wall. I've got an update for you on Kate Milton. Just throwing it out there.

Oh, man, that's so good.

You know what? I always love the road less traveled. I have texted Steve no less than 20 videos about this because I know his wife's into it, too.

I guess how many of Who am I watch?

None. It better be all of them. None.

You jerk.

None of them. Okay. So listen, guys, there's a lot to talk about. We got the GM meetings, as you saw, with Chris Johnson. You have some rule changes. We've got some salary cap stuff. But the most important thing is not even the Leifs game last night. It's Sean Coutourier getting scratched.

No, it's not.

Because that preempts the Leef game.

My name is John Toterella. Don't ask questions about the very notable thing that I did. The flyers. My first game He got it from suspension.

The Flyers scratch Couturier 34 days after being named captain.

He hasn't scored in a while. His offensive production is awful. But someone posted his underlying numbers, like his offensive of impacts and defensive impacts. He's still a very good player.

Well, and he also is coming off of an injury. Yes. And the fact that he came back to the NHL after not playing for two years because of an injury.

It was multiple back surgeries that he had over the course of the last two seasons. He played a little in the '21, '20... Or he missed the entire... No, yeah. He played a little in the '22, '23 season. No, that would have been last year. He missed all of last year, a little bit in the year before.

'21, '22.

I think you're lucky. My years are mixed.

Yeah, it was like two games, though, wasn't it?

It was 24. Yeah. But it's basically two full years because of back surgeries.

He has an opportunity to do something I think I'm quite confident no NHL player has ever done, which is be named an NHL captain, be healthy, scratched, and win the Masterton in that order in the same season. Oh, yeah. You know that's going to happen, right?

Yeah. I think there's some other contenders, but I think he's the front runner right now.

He should be. He's got to be nominated.

Everybody's nominated.

Because if you look at Patcheretti, I feel like there's a very similar case. But I don't know if we need to run down the front runners for the Bill Masterton award.

Whose struggle was the hardest?

It's a ridiculous debate to have.

I'm not going to have it. I'm not going to have it.

The old Greg Wyshinsky thing. What's that? Whenever everyone's going through what they did to deserve the trophy, he does an impression of Bill Masterton, and he goes, Yeah, I died. Is that what Greg does? He used to do it on Marek versus Yeah, I'm just going to say this. It was that or pucks him.

This is the second straight show we've brought up Bill Masterton.

That's right, because he was- His jersey is retired in Dallas. Yes. That's it. It's my guy. He knows. Jesse knows. He does know. First North Star ever to be retired. Phil Masterton. He is. No, so this is 34 days after Cutreo was named Captain. Now, it's really important, I think, for context here. If you're not following every Philadelphia Flyers outlet from the entire year because because you're not a Flyers fan. It's important to note that Torz was emphatic before the start of this year. There would be no captain.

Well, Adam, not every Flyers outlet. All but one, because one cannot get their questions answered.

Which one's that?

I think his name's Anthony Sanfilippo.

Is that the guy from the Kevin Hayes thing earlier this year?

From the Kevin Hayes story.

Oh, and Torrance was like, I'm not answering your question.

Yeah, but it was the first question yesterday. He goes, John, blah, blah, blah, and John goes, not answering That's the question. And then they move on to the next reporter.

Do you have it, Jesse? Because I have the Torterella presser. Oh, you got Couturier already.

Yeah, I think it's more important. I think that's where you're going, right?

Yeah. So I was going to do that, and then I was going to send you Rocky Thompson's press conference. But let's do that first. Let's do Coutourier.

Here's Sean Couturier, pregame after the morning skate being asked about being scratched.

Talked yesterday how trying to foot off frustration is.

Is this testing your frustration and patience?

Definitely. Like I said, I control what I can control. It is what it is. We're going to move on. Have you spoken with Chetil about this yet or no?

Somewhat, but it doesn't matter, honestly, what I think.

Got to leave my ego aside, I guess. Hopefully, team finds a way to get a win here tonight, and I can get back into it soon. You were the last guy the ice. I know you're a pretty driven worker, but how much is this driving you even more?

Yeah, it's tough. I feel I've been putting the work in for a while.

I know I've been struggling, trying to work on my game. So definitely Frustrated the way I've been treated around, I guess, lately. But that's what it is.

Has he given you any direction from what he needs to see from you or what you need to work on to make sure you're in the lineup and getting what moment is when you have been?

Not really. I've gotten the same answer as you guys. Just need to see more. I'm still looking to find out what that is, but I'm trying every game.

It's not like I'm just sitting around or doing nothing, I think.

Like I said yesterday, I felt last couple of games with the limited ice time or opportunities I've been getting, been doing all right. But I guess we're going with the best lineup available tonight to get a win.

So it is what it is.

And Adam, we keep bringing up coaches being mean, like the Nashville Predators. But gosh, darn it, they win. They keep winning. So coaches need to be more mean.

It couldn't be because... So here's what's going to happen. First off, we're not going to talk about this yet because we need to hear what Rocky Thompson-Well, with that clip in there, what two things he said that were really important were that he said he doesn't like how he's been treated lately, which is a big thing to say to the media, and he doesn't know what he can do to get back in the lineup.

He said, I have the same information as you guys, which is barely telling.

Well, and this is why I want to get to Rocky, because his agent spoke to the athletic. So I think not Rocky, Keturie's agent did speak to the athletic. So we're going to get to that in a second. But first, Rocky Thompson is the assistant assistant coach of the Philadelphia Flyers. Why is he taking a morning press conference in Philadelphia? Well, it just happened to be the time that Torrance was getting his cast off. It couldn't have been over his suspension. It had to be at that moment and that time that Rocky Thompson had to take the press conference, not Torrance. Couldn't wait till after to get a cast cut off. Had to be then. Had to be right then.

Torrance has the most fascinating relationship with the media. I know. And last night's press conference-Hold on, we're playing a clip.

Yeah. Oh. Yeah. Play the clip. Play the clip. And this is what he had to say about it. This is all that was said. Remind me. Rocky, with Sean Gattoyer, he played a lot of hard minutes early in the season, like what he had been doing before his injuries. His roles diminished a little bit. How much do you think maybe is that is watching his minutes, but also understanding it's performance-related as well?

Well, I think that that's more of a question for Torrance and how Torrance manages his minutes.

I can't get into the mind of our head coach that way. So I think Coote's done a good job.

He works extremely hard in practice, and he's trying to get himself better without a doubt. How much this time of year-How about the... That's more of a Torrance question. Then Torrance, when he does show up, We'll play that, too.

We're going to play that because I think it's important. But I want to say, here's what torts' boss said. I could tell you one thing with John Torterella. It doesn't matter who it is. That's what he's known for. He treats everybody the same way.

Yeah, that was Daniel. Yeah. Gm, backing his guy.

And then here's what Couturier's agent said about it, because this is, I think, really key to this. Who is this agent? Let me just pull it up here. Okay. Sure. Pop quiz. Hold on. You go ahead and say... I've got to pull up the article because I got the wrong link here. Okay, sure.

One positive piece of feedback with John Torterella that's always been there is, he's tough, but you always know where you stand with him. Players who go to bat for Torterella and say, We always know where we stand with him. Does Sean Cauterier sound like he knew where he was?

Not in this case. No. No. Sean Cauterier sound confused, unsure of what he can do. He didn't really understand why he was in the position he was in. One thing I thought the athletic pointed out that was interesting about this scratching, it comes off of Saturday where he played the least amount of minutes he played all season, 11 minutes. Eleven, yeah. Yeah. He got demoted to the fourth line midway through the game when they He came out for the second period. He was bumped down to the fourth line after starting in the top six. But then in the third period, I believe when the goal was scored, he directly caused a goal with a four check, something that is hard working. It's something the fourth is supposed to do on the fourth line. When you lead to those goals, usually you should be rewarded with more playing time. I'm also confused as to... I get he hasn't been playing well for a long stretch of time. Clearly, the couple of weeks he's been playing, But it's just a little confusing because he doesn't have answers himself.

Well, and here's what the agent said. Agent hasn't spoke to him. His name is Eric Loupian. He only has two contracts. He's got Shon's and he's got Gabriel Fortier from the Tampa Bay Lightning. And Couturier was at one point, up until January 13th, as Jesse said, 20 minutes on ice a night, and then it's fallen since. Here's what the agent said. He was clueless about his ice time and why his ice time went down when he spoke to him Tuesday. And this is before the scratching. But he said, I'm just going to manage and maybe manage the minutes he wants me to play. If I'm playing 14 minutes, I'm going to play 14 minutes. Throughout last year, in the beginning of this year, in conversations with Sean, he always told me that Torterella had him as a pretty good relationship. As soon as we get through that character, he's a pretty funny guy, and the conversations with him are good, and he knows what the team wants. From my point of view, when I saw the news that Catturier was scratched, I'm like, I really hope the communication why and the reasons why are really clear.

I hope he's going to get an explanation soon because he's the captain and he's the leader of this team. That's why he wanted... He said, And he's had Philadelphia tattooed on his chest since he was drafted. That's why he wanted to sign there long term. I hope he's going to get that respect from Tortarella. He has not been spoken to directly about this. I'm sure he has now.

I'm trying to figure out what order to do this in. So in defense of Torterella's decision, right? Yeah. So I talked about his underlying numbers. They're bad.

No, they're good.Oh, the underlying numbers? Yeah. On the season. On the season, yeah. But since mid-January is the point of when he's struggling.So.

This is the problem.Yeah. So you go, Oh, Why? It's pretty obvious. You look at his game log. And yes, this is just counting stats, but it matters. February 10th against the Seattle Kraken. That was Sean Couturier's last goal. He had a goal, and he was minus one that night. The next game, February 12th, against the Arizona Coyotes, he had an assist. Again, he was a minus one. The next night, or next game, minus two. Next game, minus three. Next game, minus one. Next game, minus one. Next game, minus two. Even though he had two assists. Then he was even. Then he was minus two. Then he was minus one. Even, even, even, even, minus one. His last plus game game. So his last goal was February 10th. His last plus game was a game where he had no goals, no assists against the Florida Panthers, February sixth. That was his last plus game. Plus. Dude, that's really, really tough. We gave Sean his flowers earlier in the season, and he deserved them. Torrance might have a point.

Since Just to back up your stats, since that one goal game, January 10th, if you include that game, it's one goal, seven assists total minus 16. Minus 16 since January 10th. Maybe he still injured then.

Well, when was he named Captain?

Because it was 34 days ago.

So it would have been right around the time this streak began.

Yes. Yeah, like midway through, I guess, because it would have been February 20th or something.

So basically the moment he was named Captain, his season started to go south. And Torterella is like, All right, I'm going to make a point here. Oh, go ahead. Well, and someone who... It's hard to keep track of who likes who and who dislikes who. I would have thought Brandon Dubinsky would be a huge John Torterella advocate. He was his coach in Columbus, and Brandon Dubinsky embodied a lot of the things that John Torterella demands out of his players. He was hard-nosed, he sacrificed, he blocked shots and everything. This morning, he tweets, Torts, your tactics are getting Instead of scratching and embarrassing your captain and one of your best players, how about try and tell him, I'm giving you 20 minutes tomorrow night, no matter what, with Powerplay and PK, and go play free. Have fun and fucking get it done. #freecoutourier, which will become a thing.

This is a long-running thing that John Torterella does, the most famous one being scratching Roberto Luongo in the outdoor game, the Heritage Classic game, way back when, and Luongo being still upset to this day about it.

Disastrous year. Just a disastrous year in Vancouver.

And saying Anthony Duclair can't play before Anthony Duclair decided to go all the way off.

And is still playing, by the way.

And is still playing. And weirdly, when he's not on the worst team in the league, he puts up points.

Jesse, I sent you Torterella's press conference last night. The postgame one, I got that. And then I want to read you guys a tweet.

You want it? Yeah. Go ahead.

Not answering your question. Next question.

He's wearing the cast.

So that's what I was told. I was told that he was getting a cast off and a new cast on or something like that.

That's why he didn't get a cast offer.

That was the reason given. I'm not saying that I am merely repeating what was reported, but he is wearing a cast, so it's a good catch.

Okay.

I don't think he He was lying about it.

I think the timing is suspicious.

It's curious to skip the media veil after your morning skate on the day you scratch your captain.

Yeah, that's all. I think it's on purpose.

But anyway. Fire away. Can you take a clear decision? Not answering your question. Next question. John, was there any effect? I'm sorry.

What do you got to say, Steve?

I interrupted. Steve gets to interrupt. Adam, you got to interrupt. I'm sorry. Everybody gets a free interrupt today. Okay. I'm sorry. A man in the mouth.

Subplot to this? Yeah. Listen, I'm not saying the dude doesn't deserve to be freeze out, frozen out, whatever, necessarily. I'm surprised it's still going on. I think it's hilarious he's still asking questions. I find it odd that the outlet hasn't stepped in, not that they could compel John Torterella to speak. I find it not even odd, just noteworthy that no writer or anyone at any outlet in Philadelphia is saying, No, answer his question. I guess we all know how it'll end.

Yeah, and I don't think you're going to compel torts to do anything. But I would say this, as bad as the Kevin Hayes thing was, obviously, I don't know what ended up happening. Did he have a bad source or if it was a fake story? Because it doesn't seem like he would just make it up, but it also- It's usually bad source. Bad source, probably. Yeah. So he got... And everybody from the top down when you're in journalism, these guys, I'm not going to mention names, but there have been some sources that have just blown people up-Shoy of talking.in the last... Yeah, well, there's one that It hasn't hurt anybody. But there's been a lot at stake, and those sources have burned the reporters. And so what I will say about this guy, and I don't know what he's like, and I don't know what he represents, and I'm not sure what his outlet does, I will respect the fact that he shows up and still tries to ask a question. I'll respect that.

It's my favorite recurring bit. I'm just I'm fascinated. It's still going.

We should probably do a super cut at the end of the year towards saying he's not going to answer that guy's questions. I bet there's-Flyers Nation is all over.

It's been at least four.

Flyers Nation is a great account, by the way. You should follow them.

At least four that I've seen. All right, Jesse, go. Jesse, pause. I can't take a clear decision. I'm not answering your question. Next question. John, was there any effect, do you think, with pulling Sean Couturey from the lineup? What were you looking for from the team by making that? As I told you, I'm putting the players out on the ice to win a particular game, and these were the 20 that we decided to go with. He seemed a little... I'm not talking on Sean I'm not debating with you. I'm not conversing with it. It's between Sean and I. So just talk to me about the game, guys. So you won't talk to Sean.

You won't talk to them. Steve.

The team responded, especially- It has nothing to do with Sean being out.

You're asking me about the team? How did they respond in your eyes? Our team played good There you go.

And then somebody says something with Sean Catturio's name in the question, but about the team and the response. And he's like, it basically makes him rephrase the question later on.

Oh, yeah. So about three minutes in.

We're not going to watch the full three.

No, I know. I should have got the time stamp. Jesse, can you go to three minutes, 30 seconds?

No. This is the 40-second clip.

It's a 40-second.

Oh, never mind. I watched the whole- That was the end of the clip.

See, no. Someone, I don't know who it was, asked a question about the team. Maybe you and I are talking the same one. They framed it in a way that got a really insightful answer out of Torz. I'm like, Torz doesn't realize it right now, but he's answering a question about Sean Cattourier. The question is about the team and everything, but it will absolutely be framed in a way that it's about Sean Cattourier because it is.

He scratched the captain.

I think it was nick Andrade, producer nick. He goes, When was the last captain who got scratched? The The only one I can think of is Andrew Farence.

Why did Andrew... Oh, he was the oilers captain.

Yeah, and they were awful. But that was a very long time ago.

Yes, probably, what, 15 years ago?

I don't know about 15, but maybe a decade. It was quite a while.

It doesn't happen. It was a McTavish era, at least.

He was the captain. He was in the lineup, and then the longer his tenure went on, he was the captain, but he wasn't an everyday player.

Yeah. This I want to read this tweet. It's from Acting the Fulliman, and I love this tweet.

I bet you do.

The basic theory of John Torterella is, A, he'll get the most out of a team with few stars on it, and B, he makes it considerably more likely that you will have such a team. And that tweet is from March 11, 2021.

Oh, wow. Who is he? He would have been with Columbus.

And I think I hate to bring this up because I know it's a sore spot. Actually, I don't hate to bring this up, but I know it is a sore spot with Flyers fans. No one's ever got an answer as to why Cutter Goche was like, Yeah, I'm not going to play here. I would imagine, I would posit that that might be part of it. I think, and listen, there's a big gap between here and there. I recognize that. But he all of a sudden just didn't want to play there.

Philadelphia. I think that's a fair point, Adam. But the counter is, all right, we're going to send you the Anaheim then. I don't know. Dude, they're almost a carbon copy of what they were last year. We're competitive. We're fun and we're fun, and we're scrappy, and then just a point happened sometime in the winter where they're just like, We're actually the most joyless hockey team in the face of the place.

Yeah, because the vibes were good for a bit.

For a bit? They do all right in the fall. And then, Holy shit, they are unwatchable.

Now, there was a culture issue in Philadelphia, or at least if you ask the flyers, that's what it was under Chuck Fletcher. They have gotten rid of some of the players that were part of that culture issue. Torts got a win last night. Everybody's treated the same, according to Danny Breer. So he's right. Okay. So when Sean Couturier inevitably comes back and plays well, people are going to attribute it to the scratch.

Oh, this happens every time.

And what I would like to tell you before this happens is that Sean Couturier is a good player who's come through crazy back surgeries and an injury this season in-season to play, and he was playing well at the beginning of the year. Sean Couturier will play well when he comes back because Sean Catturier is good at hockey. It's not because Torts benched him. It's because he's a good player, coming off an injury, not finding his game.

It'll also be because his teammates are going to try to They're going to try to find him for a goal. We see it-And does Torts know that?

Is that the genius of Torts? I don't know. This is where he loses me.

Every coach wins this situation no matter what, because no one... Let's say Catturier It just sucks for the rest of his career.

Then everybody's going to be like, he was right.

He was right. And no one ever goes, well, he was part of his downfall. They just go, no, the downfall happened long before he was scratched. He's just garbage now. And if he comes back, it won't be about, well, he was good earlier in the It'll be John Totorella. But guys will try to find Couturey for a goal. Now, we see it when guys are approaching a milestone. And I heard a funny story that I think I've told a few times on this show where a guy was close to a milestone that would have earned him a bonus in his contract. Final game of the season, and he's like, Boys, you got to find me. Boys, you got to find me. Boys, you got to find me. And he was being annoying about it. So no one was passing him the ball all night, except for one player, lower in the lineup, who was Basically, the story is this player walked into the room, second intermission, and said, I'll give 10 grand to whoever assists.

So a kid who's like, I could use 10 grand.

They're like, Well, I could use 10 grand. So they just started passing it to him all third period. And at some point during the third period, he fed him for a wide open net and he missed. And so the guy who set him up walked into the dressing room. He goes, I don't give a shit. I demand my 10 grand because I set you up for that and you screwed It up. Wow. Yeah.

I like that.

I don't remember if I ever said the name, so I'm not going to say them now.

No, that's good, though. That's a good story.

It's a great story. I would bet money on Keturius scoring next game.

I would. Okay. And I would, too. What's your prediction, guys, on how this all goes? Is this something... Because here's the thing with torts, is that oftentimes this does happen. It's usually not to such a important player to the roster. It's not usually to the captain. It's never to It's never to the captain. That's why it's such a story. But how do you think this goes for Philly after this? They did win last night. We will talk about the game. What's your prediction for the remainder of the season? Is this a, he got benched and this is the turning point, and now they're going to make the playoffs? Or is it the room split and they're pissed at the coach?

If they make the playoffs, I think it's business as usual. We go back to talking about the usual flyer story lines, which is they're a pretty decent team. If they miss the playoffs, we're talking about He just reports his job.

Jesse?

I don't think that's the case at all about him losing his job because-We're talking about it. I don't think so, because I think right now, what were your expectations of the Philadelphia Flyers coming into the season?

Oh, they'd be poor.

Exactly. In Right now, they sit third in the Metro division, comfy, not comfy in a playoff spot, but in a playoff spot, and looks like they should be able to hang on based on the percentages of how many games are left. And I think I'm in the minority that I trust Daniel Breer and John Chotterella right now in what they're doing because they're so far above anything I could have ever imagined. I'm willing to give them leeway with this decision. I think I'm not going to criticize Torterella for scratching Coutourier, even though I don't understand, and I think he should explain to Coutourier at least why he's scratch. But I trust from the outside, looking in that the flyers are doing something right here because that's all they've proven. How am I supposed to look at the Flyers organization and say, No, they're a mess right now. When all they've done so far this season is exceed expectations tenfold. So I'm going to trust that right now they're still doing that and that this decision is going to, in the end, prove to be fruitful for the team, and they're going to probably be in a playoff spot to come the playoff, and everybody's going to be shocked.

And it's going to be a win for them all for the whole year.

So one thing for, towards, and one thing against. The thing against, it gets on my nerves, is a reporter asking question about Sean. He goes, That's between me and Sean. And then you hear from Sean, and he goes, I don't know what's going on. And then you hear from his agent, and he goes, I don't know what's going on. And then you got to trick him into inadvertently talking a little bit about Sean.

Like a dog trying to get him to eat a pill. You got to put in some cheese first.

Yeah, exactly.

You got to feed towards some cheese so he can take his medicine.

Yeah, here. Let me slather some flea and tick medication onto this peanut butter. Oh, wait. I got it. Oh, shit. Sorry, Iggy. Anyway, shut up and eat this. Iggy, you like peanut butter, right? Yeah. It's just ridiculous. I understand the old-school hockey thing. It stays in the room. No, it stays inside of the skull casing of John Torterella because He won't let anyone in on the decision, including the player who it was made by. The thing in favor of him is he's perhaps doing something that a lot of coaches are just not able to do, which is he's seeing beyond the letter. None of us would make a fuss at all about a player with the stat line that you just outlined, Jesse. What was it?

Since January 10th, so that last goal, he's got that goal, one goal, and then none since. Seven assists, minus 16.

I mean, that's miserable.

Yeah. Plus, minus doesn't matter until it's egregious on either end. Minus 16 since January 10th is a lot.

Yeah. I mean, dude, you He didn't have a plus game in a goal for a month.

That's crazy. Minus 15 over a season is a lot. Minus 15 since January. Jan, 16. That's crazy.

I'm trying to see what is he on this season.

So torts is making a decision- Still minus six. Regardless of the C on the chest.

I think where you air, if there's one place where I would say, torts, come on, Couturier says, I'm looking for what exactly he's looking for, right? And if the answer is more, it can't be that. This can't be one of those things where you ask somebody, are you mad at me? And they go, yes. And you go, okay, why? And they go, well, you should know. That is not how this relationship needs to work. You need to say, As the coach, Sean, I recognize that you're struggling right now. Let's go through the stat line. You know that you're struggling. You don't have to tell players. They know. Unless they're completely diluted. And some are. But Sean, it does not strike me as that. Then you say, I'm sitting here for a game. When you come back, I need A, B, and C. Otherwise, there's going to be deeper conversations about this.

But if what John Torrela has been doing has been working and which has been not giving Couturier the answers, and whatever coaching style he has, he's been doing that for the six months of the season has been going on. If that's been working, I have a hard time telling him, Change your ways. Because what you're explaining, Adam, is the right way to go about that human to human, business to business. But John Torterella doesn't operate like that. And so far, it's been successful.

How are you not pissed off as John Torterella, that the guy you named Captain immediately turned into a pumpkin?

I think there's something into that.

I don't think he named him Captain.

Torch didn't want a captain. I think that came from above Torch. Yeah.

Well, that's no bueno.

I think you can read between the lines here. That's not a good way to run a two. Sorry? I think you can read between the lines here in that he probably doesn't look at Coutourier as his captain.

You have a coach undermining their GM and a GM undermining their coach.

Good luck.

Always works out.

I think that's a whole other bucket of is Coutourier the captain in Torterella's eyes? But I think it might be in play here.

It's the 60th anniversary of Tim Hortons roll of the room to win, and we're still waiting for Steve to win, so we can all go to San Diego.

You know what? I'm not bringing you.

There's two ways that we could go to San Diego via Steve. It's if he wins the $10,000 Daily Jackpot or if he wins the Hilton Vacation, which is also available. You can see all this stuff on the cup. There's Hudson's Bay gift cards, there's Instacart. I use Instacart all the time, by the way. I love Instacart. Cytoplex store, Rackuten, and Steve's favorite show, Bass Pro Shops. Give Cards to Bass Pro Shops.

You know who I'm going to bring instead of you? Who? Tim Horeani. Tim Horeani? Yes, because... From our Formula One show? Yeah. If I need someone to drive around San Diego, he'll go very fast. And also, his name is Tim. It's fitting.

Tim on the Tim. I get it.

Steve has been vindicated.

Why?

I know. Major League Base. They did a player survey, and they asked, What's your favorite road city in Major League Base? No. Number one on the entire list-No.of all the cities in Major League Base, San Diego.

San Diego. Give it to me. We're going. We're going. You can earn rolls on your Tim's faves, including hot or ice coffee, breakfast sandwiches, loaded bowls, and more. Make sure to play on the Tim's app, available for download on the App Store or Google Play. Tim's 60th anniversary of Roll Up The Rim to Win is on now until March 31st. Time to get rolling. Rules apply. Canada only. No purchase necessary for contrast entry. Visit the Tim's app for details. Do you want to look cool this summer?

Yeah, but I need something.

Well, you probably need polarized sunglasses. How about more than one pair of polarized sunglasses? Because shady rays. Look at Jessie. Damn, shady Jessie. Look at... Oh, wow. The Aviator look is Wow, it looks good on you.

Shady rays.

You got this handy dandy mouth guard. That's right.

Not great for commercial reads, but great for storing your sunglasses.

I don't think that's what those...

This is not what it's for? No.

But it's okay.

You looked cool while you were doing it.

I It definitely did. Shady Rains has given out the best deal of the season. Head to ShadyRains. Com and use SDP for 50% off two or more polarized sunglasses. Try for yourself the shades that are rated five stars by over 300,000 people. Jesse, how much cooler? Okay, normally On a normal day, how cool do you feel out of 10?

One.

Now, with your Shady Rays sunglasses, how do you feel out of 10? A million.

Give me a quick finger guns.

Can you give me a double finger guns?

Oh, Wow.

It's the sound that really... That and the sunglasses.

That's cool. Man, it's got a good snap. Again, ShadyRays. Com, use the code SDP for 50% off two or more pairs of polarized sunglasses. Shadyrace and SDP and Jesse looking cool.

Wait, Jessie.

I'm winking. Jesse, take them off. Take them off. Oh, what a dork. Hold on.

Nice.

So cool.

Now, the game. Tell me if you They disagree with any of this. Leaves were sloppy. They let in a goal in the first 20 seconds.

They were completely unprepared for what Philly was going to bring, which was the most obvious thing in the world.

They hit six posts. They come back and make it three, two, but then let the Flyers get the fourth on a yard sale play. Horrible. Tavar scores late in the game. Hooray. And that's it. First time in eight meetings, the Flyers have actually beaten the Leaps. Sheldon Keefe saying this, didn't like anybody, didn't like the forwards, didn't like the Defense, didn't like the goal tending. So here's what I want to throw at you.

Oh, man. This Toronto media.

Were really hard.

Quoting a coach verbatim.

Let's talk about score adjusted expected goals. Hell, yeah. Cool. What's that? It's the sexiest stat in the world, guys.

Explain it to me.

I remember when I met Natalie for the first time as a divorcee with a child, the way that I attracted her into my web was, let me tell you about score adjusted expected goals. And she was like, damn, that's hot. Let's get married. Yeah.

I didn't previously have a high expected divorces rate.

I did. Skyrocket. So last night, McKay Benwa. Benwa gets back in.

No, explain to me what the stat is.

Well, Steve, you could probably explain it better than I did.

The Leaps did a better job of controlling instances where the Puck might go in over the other favor.

It's possession stat. Yes. What? It's possession of play stat.

What is score adjusted expected goals? Give me the God damn. Let me see.Expected goals?Yeah.

And then score adjusted Corsi.

Score adjusted expected goals.

Yes. Mckay Benwa, 56. You want to be over 50%, right? Yes. Look at it like face offs. If you're over 50%, that's good. Hooray. Mckay Benwa, 56.2%. Yep.

The good pairing that's consistently good was good.

Edmondson Lilligren, still figuring it out, 42.6%..

They had a Monstruously terrible first period, and then recovered.

Riley Lilligren, limited ice time.

And score effects.

But 95.6 %. Yeah, holy shit. Riley Brodie, 29 %.

I am going to- I got another one for you.

Before you go do that.

You ready for this? Is it also hard to understand?

Riley with Brodie, 47 % expected goals. Riley without Brodie, Mccabe with Brody, 52% expected goals. Mccabe with Brodie, 41% expected goals. Mccabe without Brodie, 53% expected goals. Lilligren with Brodie, 47% expected goals. Lilligren without Brodie, 54% expected goals. Again, you want to be over 50% here.

Either this player is bad or this player is struggling, or the coaching staff has absolutely no idea how to deploy this human being. I never thought we would to the point where I earnestly thought the Leifs' playoff roster would feature T. J. Brodie as a healthy scratch. But if they're healthy, Reilly Labushkin, give me that pair. We've seen that pair work.

And Bush wasn't in last night because he had the flu or something. Yes.

Mekabe Benwa, absolutely. Give me that pair. I've seen it work. And then the third pair, I've seen Brodie Lillegren work. I've seen it not work.

You didn't get Edmondson to sit him.

Yeah, I've seen Edmondson. Well, exactly. I've seen Edmondson-Lilligran work. I've seen it not work. Brody is the sixth or seventh defenseman, by my estimation. You Ant. Okay, pick a leaf defenseman at random.

Jake McCabe.

Okay, Jake McCabe is hurt.

All right? Don't like that.

He's hurt. We don't like that. So what are your new pairs?

Well, you would want Reilly Bush. You You probably want Edmondson Lilligran because you're trying to make fetch happen. Trying to make that work. Trying to make fetch happen. Yeah.

And you go Benwa Lilligran?

That makes some sense. Benwa Lilligran could work.

That makes some sense. Yeah.

Oh, wait. No, I think you keep Lilligren and Edmondson together.

Lillagrin and Edmondson. Oh, yeah. Sorry, I screwed it up. So that means you got to do-Honor Tim? Brody with Benwa. And you probably do Brody on the right, I guess. They can both switch. Yeah. Okay, that's fine. We can do that.

We can try that. Especially if it's the third pair. Yeah. Limited minutes.

You know what you can't do? Ever again, ever fucking again after last night, ever again. Or I will protest outside a Scotia Bank Arena like Lisa Simpson outside the nuclear power plant. I will write a song and bring a guitar and everything if they put Riley and Brody back together. Never again. That's enough. Holy shit. It's right. Do you know how many guys would need to be injured before I'd even entertain that again? Name another defenseman at random.

Connor Timpins.

He's already out of the line.

You mean like playing in the lineup? Yeah, sorry.

Name a defenseman who played last night.

Morgan Reilly.

Oh, shit. Well, no. Adam, that fucks the bid up. Okay. Name a defenseman, not Reilly or Brody.

This isn't going well, guys.

Okay, Lilligren.

Lilligren. Great. Lilligren. So Lilligren is hurt, and Jake McCabe is hurt. What do you do?

Well, you got to Connor Timmins in there because you had to keep him over Will Legacy. Yes, for sure.

So guess what? Reilly Bush. That stays. Did you think it wouldn't? It stays. So Lilligren's out. We got Benoît, I guess, Brody, and then who else is there? Edmondson. I guess you got to go Timmins or geo.

Or geo.

Edmondson or geo. Yes, two lefties because you couldn't have gone out and got another right. You just couldn't have. You can't put Riley, Brody together. You can't do it.

Jesse, you by chance have the goals on your computer screen right now?

Which one do you want?

Any of them that Riley and Brodie were on for.

We can do the first one and the second one.

I'll send you a phone. Let's not do goal one because that was Edmondson-Lilligran, I believe. Also bad.

No, the first one... Oh, no. Yeah, I'm talking about the first one, not after 10 seconds into the game.

Okay, that makes sense.

I just sent you what I think is the three-nothing goal.

Sure.

And it's a great one. It's a super good one.

Let's go in order.

No.

The second goal here. No. You're messing me up. No. How many air drops coming my way. This was the first goal, which Which angle do you want? Do you want me to pause it? Which angle you want to give us? Do you want me to pause it on when it goes in?

Yeah, right around there. Just right as he's about to take the shot. Because you want to see it right before. What went wrong? Now, let's bring it up on screen, Matty, if we can. Don't Don't put our faces up here. Let's just look at this thing. Sure. Okay. So we've got Austin Matthews is in the middle there. It's a bit blurry. Morgan Reilly is behind Austin Matthews, covering nobody at the red dot right there. And then can we put the... What's TJ Brody up to?

Over here in front of the net? Right there. You want to go back a little? You can see how the movement happens.

Yeah, it'd be great.

Let's have a look. Brody's here.

You ever see a Christmas tree at the side of the highway that has exactly one bulb on it? Mm-hmm. That's what he looks like on this play. He's just hanging off the guy vaguely and gently.

Okay.

What are you looking at?

Well, here's what I want. Where is number 78?

Down here.

That's right. What is number 78 doing?

Right now? Moving to where the fuck is. Staring at the back of a wide open flyers.

How did they get there? It's my question. Now, let's move forward a little bit, Jesse. Yeah. Okay. Moving forward. Again, this is grade school stuff. This is house league We got Bertuzzi cheating a little bit down. We got Matthews hooking around into where he should be as a center in the defensive zone. Morgan Reilly was on the guy at the boards. He's got to leave the net open, right? This is on TJ Brody. Let's go forward just a little bit further.

I don't love the forwards here either. Just in fairness.

Okay, so TJ Brody right here, right here is exactly where he needs to be. What the defenseman needs to do right here is you You tie up the player's stick, even if the player is bigger than you, and you try to move them out of the way.

And for people listening, where is he?

Tj Brody is in front of the net with the Flyer's player. I don't even know who it is. And he is all over. He's white on rice, like maple leaf, white on Flyer, black and orange. All over him.

What's that face? You never heard that one?

Oh, yeah. No.

It's very old for him. It is old, but that's fine.

Like shit on Velcro. Now, that one.

Let's keep going. That's an old man frame. Let's go a little bit for it. A little bit for it. A little bit for it. Okay. Yeah. Is that better? Oh, T. J. Brodie. Now he's standing directly in front of the Philadelphia flyer defenseman.

Who's in front of the goal.

Offensive player. Yeah, who's in front of Elias Ames enough. So what T. J. Brodie should do here is, again, he hasn't done it yet, tie up his stick and move him out of the way.

No, he's filming a Rihanna video. Work, work, work, work.

And then move forward just a little bit further. And now he has moved himself completely off of the flyer player in front of Sammie, who Sammie has to come out to cover the angle, but he can only get out so far because the flyer player is still standing there, and TJ Brodie's got his stick right around where the flyer player's waist is and in front of Sammie's eyeballs.

I don't love the game Sammie played, But good Lord. What's he supposed to do? They really made a job especially difficult.

Where in there, guys, did TJ Brodie attempt to move this flyer player? We talked about what Brad Treliving wants out of this defense corps, right? He can't do it. And he can't because he is the lightest defenseman they have. But he doesn't even try to. He may not be able to move that player. That player seems a lot taller than TJ Brody is, but you can tie him up, and you must tie him up.

He just doesn't do a good enough job of it. I would healthy scratch him. I'm serious. If the playoff started today. Everything we've been told Brad Treleving believes about what he wants from this team and defense and all that, he doesn't do a lick of it.

Well, and I think he's probably a holdover from what Dubas wanted, which is smooth-skating, puck-moving defensemen who are not that physical.

This is a guy that Brad's already let walk once. I think it's going to happen again.

Jesse, could we go to the next goal? Sure. Would that be possible?

I'd like to run through this. We don't do this very often, credit questioning the team that scored the goal. But Travis Sandheim does a good job getting loose on the weak side of the zone.

He had such a good game.

He did a great job there getting wide open for that wrist shot that went in. So a little credit to Mr. Sandheim.

Something that I want you to look out for, too, when you're watching the Leaps play defense, especially this week, we saw it versus Carolina, is how deep the forwards are collapsing in, too. They are not gapping up on the point, and it's costing them. Sanhime could have the game that Sanhime had last night because nobody's covering them. Okay, now pause here. Can we bring that up on the screen?

Sure.

I can't help but notice it's the same group of Clueless forwards.

Okay, fine. It's Matthews, Bertuzzi, Brodie, Reilly, who are all on for the last goal.

They're all back there on this one.

When you look at this, Bertuzzi cannot skate fast enough to catch Sandheim there.

If the fuck goes to Sandheim, Bertuzzi, what are you doing? You can't. And part of me feels like this is the game plan. Bertuzzi doesn't have the foot speed to catch Sandheim quickly enough to challenge him for the fuck. And if you notice when the Lefs play in the other team's defensive zone, so when the Lefs are in the offensive zone, their forwards, most teams' forwards, they play with the Lefs the Flyers did last night, are all over.

Wait, are you saying Bertuzzi couldn't get to here? No.

You don't think- Sandheim would- You don't think he would blast- The fuck is along the other side? He skates like a zamboni. There's no way. No.

You don't think Bertuzzi could take two steps and walk over here?

He's trying to- Too far away. The Leaps are two on one on the put carrier, and he's hoping that one of them can dig it to him and he can at least chip it out.

Is that not what's happening? I think so. But if you don't have possession, you have to gap up on that defenseman. You do. You flat out do. Listen, Bertuzzi is not known for his foot speed, guys, especially his first three strides.

No, but if I'm him, I'm assuming my boys are going to win this battle.

So you're hoping in this battle that the put comes through center?

Yes.

No. Most likely it would go to Brody right there, right? Probably. Brody.

And then he's got to wring it around.

You got to have a man.

So what's Bertuzzi doing? This is my point. And then you go to... Okay, so you look at Reilly.

He's the winger who's high.

Reilly He's on for all can't be down low. I'm asking him to stay high. I'm telling him to get higher because all the guys are down low.

Has a responsibility, right?

Yeah.

And now no one's got anybody. Keep going. Look at this.

Now we got Reilly. You could see him there with the assistant captain on the Jersey. You got... And again, where are the forwards? Are they gapped up on the defense or not? They're not.

What's Bertuzzi?

Look, Bertuzzi just let him go.

He has three open men he can pass it to and a deflection completely open in the slot. It's so bad. It's so bad.

And so you look at- It's so bad. What's... Tj Brodie is going to kiss this flyer person, and Morgan Reilly is doing what?

Screening his goalie.

So what happens?

The goal goes in. Go fast forward a little bit. And it's Sammie's fault, apparently.

Here's the thing. You saw where T. J. Brodie was a second ago. He was on that player with the nine on his jersey, and he let him go. Look, he let him go. He Let him go.

Yeah, because the puck is being shot. So you're not guarding this player if the puck's coming at you.

I'm sorry. I put that whole game squarely on the coach. They were completely unprepared for the beginning of the game, first 20 seconds. I hate this pairing of Reilly Brodie with all my heart, and he keeps deploying them with the same group of forwards who don't know what they're doing.

It did work when Brodie first arrived in Toronto, Reilly Brodie worked because the The one before it had been Reilly Ceece.

And Marlo was a 20 goal scorer.

Exactly.

Times change, man. That's enough. We have at least two years of runway of this being dog shit. Exactly. We got to stop. We're not just dog shit. Like, easily their worst option.

Here's a question.

Should we get back on screen? Yeah. At some point, I missed my face. There you are. I missed your face even more.

Should Brad Treliving have traded T. J. Brody at The Trade Deadline?

Yeah.

If he was a GM that could look a little into the future a little better, is that not the right move he should have made?

I mean, hindsight, 2020.

You're screaming here about something that is factual. This hasn't worked.

I didn't think he was so bad you needed to get rid of him.

But it makes sense with the contract expiring, him not coming back. Plus, you're acquiring all of these debt fees for all of your draft picks instead of packaging them for one big one. Why not move off of this now and you have the bodies that can fill that in. You're not losing anything based on how he's playing.

If you can move off a Brody and bring in another D. I don't think they could have afforded to be net down a defenseman. No. But if you can move off a Brody and bring in another D, one that shoots right. Oh, my God. I'll just yell and scream about that until I die. Eventually, I guess. Yeah, I would have been on board with that. But they're determined to not do the obvious thing.

There's no reason that... Because Brody's five... 4.5, is it? Brody? Five. Five? On the button. Five on the button. There's no reason you can't move out that for... Even if it's just somebody who wants a defenseman, you sell that for draft mix, and then you go around and you flip that for... Now you have the $5 million in cash space. That's like three defensemen who went at the trade deadline. You could have got Dumba, Stetcher, everybody else you wanted, and just added 10 guys for that cap space.

My guess is no one wanted it. Like, dude, you're trying to give me an expiring defenseman who makes five when there's all these other guys available who are playing at least as well as he is. Yeah, you got to eat half. And the Leaps go, Well, I'm not eating half. And the other team goes, No, I'm not doing it. The best time to do this would have been in the offseason.

If the Lefs are even selling Brody at half, that's still 2.5 free in Capspace.

I don't think anyone wanted He wanted it.

I wonder if it was even on the table because based on how Raja Living has operated, I don't think he even thought about it.

Matt Dumba was traded for moving back. I think it was 60 pics from the fifth round to the seventh. He was free. Yeah, which means I don't think there was a trade out there for T. J.

Matt Dumba was also, remember, the reason it was so cheap was that nobody wanted him, and the Arizona Coyotes wanted him off the books before the end of the year because they don't want to pay him anymore.

And he was cheaper. He's got a lower cap hit Brody. I don't know if there was a move out there. And Brad Treliving had a funny quote in a... I think it was a CJ article.

We're going through that, too, later in the show, but you bring it up.

Well, the quote was basically, Well, there's not much to do with the rest of the season except drink coffee and swear, which I related to deeply. So to me, the Brody situation is spilt milk. You got to ice your best roster, and he ain't on it.

The reason I wanted to start with Couturier is because I was thinking, listen, it's a bit of an odd situation in Philadelphia, but when you get dive into the numbers, you can understand it. Sure. I wish the Leaps had that.

This is what I'm saying. I feel like torts as rude as it is and as much as I wish he would communicate with the player. He's seeing past letter. He's seeing past career games played. He's seeing past Cap hit. He's seeing past all of it, and he's just going, Here's my best roster of 20 men. To me, when they're healthy, Brodieate on this list of 20 men.

Something else that I think is bubbling under the surface. First off, you should know that last night's game was game 67.

Of course it was. I should have made a bigger deal of that. I was too busy eating mustard.

Does no Marner equal no Matthews? Has Mitch Marner made money on his contract negotiation this Listen, we're the Toronto Media. We're so tough. We're so tough on them.

This is the first topic on TSA 1050 today.

Absolutely.

I'm not moving off of what I said last show. They don't have depth because of the money that they spend on these players. They can't even replace what Marner does. You know what I mean? Like your top goal scorer or your top playmaker maker goes down, of course, you're going to have a really difficult time replacing them. They can't ice a line with the best goal scorer in the world that looks playable. It's really, really bad. So you put out Max Domi because Max Domi, we talked about last show-Good passer. He's the best playmaker on the team, not named Mitch Marner. You could throw William Neelander in there, except William Neelander, I mean, boy, boy, boy, boy, cannot force him to give a flying fuck about the defensive end of the park.

Max or Willey?

Willey. Max always tries and is just bad at it, whereas Willy is just aloof. And the games where he's engaged, he's one of the best players in the world. And the games where he's not, he's an absolute liability in his own end. So Sheldon won't play them together, won't I'll play them together. Bertuzzi is hot right now. So he's put Bertuzzi with Matthews. What I would do, what I was thinking last night is I would reunite Bertuzzi, Tavares, Neylander. But then who the hell does that leave with Matthews? You leave him with Nye, who was his previous linemate, and then who? Max Domi? I guess. Then your third line is Robertson with friggin. What do you What do you do right now with Yarn Croke and Marner out of the lineup?

Robertson had a bad game last night. He did.

Horrible game. Bad, bad game.

After scoring in the previous one-I know he-No, he looked terrible.

I know he's still figuring it out, and I understand why, and I would want him to be pissed off that he was demoted for contract reasons and all that stuff. He was one of the guys that could be demoted when everybody was healthy for a split second there. But you could completely see why he was. I've been beating that drum all I think there's a really good player there. But games like that, you're just not going to get in.

He doesn't have good decision making. I wish he was better. I wish the game was slower for him so we could make better decisions because it seems like when he's entering the zone or he's trying to exit the zone, if he has the fuck at that point, he's just not good at making the best decision at the moment for his team.

I think it was the 4-2 goal.

The Scott Laughton one?

Yeah. Blown zone entry on the power play, blown zone entry on the power play, blown zone One entry on the power play, can't handle the pass, fuck goes the wrong way, and you try to block the shot with your neck, and it doesn't work. Last night, watching Matthews with whoever he was playing with because it alternated a little bit. You know what Line It reminded me of? It was Matthews with Andreas Jonsson and Kesperi Kappinen. You know what? I'm just going to put them with two grunts. And that was another coach who did that, by the way. That was Mike Babcock who tried that. I'm going to try one of the most gifted hockey players in the entire world with grunts who can do some stuff. They can do some stuff. Tyler Bertuzzi is far better than either of those players. You could argue Max Domi, even at this point in his career, is better than neither of those players ever were. But it just seemed like a premium version of that line.

Yeah. Would it not be advantageous to staple Nielander to Matthews while Marner's out? You just load up? Yeah. Is that not the smarter play here?

I think so.

I keep going back to the Dicky D analogy. When I went to summer camp as a kid, I would have change in my pocket, excited for the Dicky D man to show up, the ice cream man to ride up with his weird Dicky D bicycle. I would try to get a dollar fifty or $2 or whatever it was. God, I sound old, for the chocolate baseball glove with the bubble gum ball.

I'm glad that you pointed it out.

I know.

Yeah. That chocolate baseball glove was always very underwhelming. Yeah. Now, the chocolate ice cream sucked and the bubble gum, there was no taste to it.

Yeah, but guess what? It was the cheapest thing the Dicky D man had to offer. Now it's $17.

You be-rabbeded me. I was just going to rip on you for being the oldest man here. No. You're talking about how you get ice cream for a penny.

I do live in a trailer with my mom.

You got there first. Anyways, continue.

But you have a best friend named Chetabarb.

Sorry.

Anyway, what was I saying? I would have the change in my pocket.

Back in 1942.

I would have the change in my pocket in 1942. Laurier was Prime Minister, whoever it was. I don't care. Listen, I would have three quarters and two dimes and three nickels, and I would stack them up on top of each other, and I would try to make them add up to the $2 I needed for the chocolate baseball glove. Sometimes I would put the quarters on the bottom and the dimes in there and then the nickels. No, here, let me rearrange it, and I'll do it from smallest to... And I couldn't make it add up to $2. That is me looking at the leaves forward group every freaking year under this current setup.

It's not enough.

It's not enough. And you're like, But I have three quarters.

You're like, That's not enough.

Can I throw something at you?

That's Matthews Willy Marner or last night. But I have three quarters. Matthews DeVar is Willy. That should be enough. It's not.

Let me be the voice of reason for- Because the rest of the lineup is nickels and dimes. In the last 21 games, the least are 15, 6, and 1.

Yes. Good. Yes. It's good.

I agree. Can they win four rounds of a playoff?

I'm merely stating a fact.

I know it's a miserable existence to have to ask that question after every loss, but yeah, that's this team. They deserve it.

When was the last time that you guys went on an adventure?

An adventure?

An adventure that lasted too late into the evening?

Well, one time I went into the forest and I met this special goblin who gave me three wishes, but I woke up because it was a dream.

Jesse, what about you?

This one time, I had to go to Mordor and find these rings. Oh, my God. Then I was on a long journey. My friend, Frodo was there. I was talking about- and Schmigo was like, You need morning hydration to bring I'm calling you up, you need liquid IV.

Is what I'm trying to say. No.

What? Read it again. It's liquid the fourth.

It's not liquid the fourth. It's liquid IV. It's liquid IV?

I've been calling it liquid the fourth this whole Liquid IV.

Yes.

I thought there were three liquids before it.

It's great for your daily workout. When you feel run down, when you've had a long night out, when you've had a long flight, that's when you need liquid IV. And by the way, we all use it.

That's true. And maybe I need some right now.

Maddie does, too. Maddie's all the way in on liquid.

When you got to go find those rings and throw them into a giant eyeball of fire, you need some liquid IV for your adventure.

It is non-GMO and free of gluten, dairy or soy. There are eight vitamins, no artificial sweeteners. However you hydrate, grab liquid IV Hydration Multiplier. It's sugar-free, and you can get it in bulk nationwide at Costco or 20% off on your first order when you go to liquidiv. Com and use the code Dangle, D-A-N-G-L-E at checkout. Again, that's 20% off your first order. When you shop Hydration today, use that promo code Dangle, D-A-N-G-L-E at liquidiv. Com. Now, CJ interviewed Brad for Living. On that roster, this is a good segue, they've got Basically, here's C. J. Wrights, and then we're going to get a quote. So C. J. Wrights, they've got nine proven NHL defensemen, for example, and some tough decisions to be made in the bottom six forward group once Mitch Marner and Calleigh Yarncroke return from injury. We may not have the best top four on defense. But if you go deep, and we wanted to, we wanted to make sure we had seven, eight, and nine that were better than anybody else's so we don't have that big of a drop. You've got to try to win in a margin somewhere. So we thought that was the thought process.

Adam, I had such a hard time paying attention to what you just read. Why? Because can you start from the top?

No, there's a line in there that gives you insight into how Brad's thinking about this line.

Do you want me to read from the CJ line or the Brad?

The CJ line Start from the top.

C. J. Says, They've now got nine proven NHL defensemen, for example, and some tough decisions to be made in the bottom six forward group once Mitch Marner and Callea Yarn Croke return from injury.

Nine proven? Fucking who? Yeah. No, you extraordinarily do not.

Reilly Brody.

One. Okay, fine.

No, he's a proven NHL defenseman. He's a proven defenseman.

Yeah, fine. He's a NHL defenseman.

I'll give you that one.

Mckay Benwa. Sure. Edmondson Lilligran.

Sure. Sure.

Then you've got Giordano. Giordano is a proven NHL defenseman.

He's the oldest man to play hockey this year. Yes. He is proven.

But can he and has he played hockey and won a Norris Trophy?

That's not what's happening right now.

Yes, he has. Signed Nikola Lindstrom. I don't care how long he's been retired. That dude was a star.

Is Jake Muzzin on there? Even an NHL defenseman.

Jake Muzzin. Add Matt Murray to the...

He got two cups. He got two cups. Matt Murray, Stanley Cup champion. Ilia Labushkin.

John Klingberg.

Ilia Labushkin. John Klingberg.

Sorry. Okay. Ilia Labushkin.

Brody Reilly.

Why are we starting in this again?

Because I lost track.

Brody Reilly, Benwaa, McCabe.

Can I read from Cal friendly? Please. We'll make this thing a whole lot. Please. Reilly Brody, McCabe, Lilligran, Timmins, Edmondson, Benwaa, Labushkin.

Timmins, absolutely not.

No, Timmins, not. But Giordano, I would say is.

So 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 plus geo. That's eight.

And then check who else is on it.

And then who am I missing? I guess that's eight.

Eight. You're not counting geo.

No, eight with geo. So you guys aren't counting Timmins or Benwa or whoever you want to take out.

But you got to count one of them. All that was with CJ's part of the article. And I think he's saying, Can these guys play NHL Minutes?

You know who's a proven NHL defenseman? Robert Bertuzo. And imagine you had eight of them. There you go.

Roll out those eight. So here's what Brad said. They're eight proven. Are they good? Are they good? So Brad head.

And do they play well together?

We may not have the best top four on defense, but if you go deep to make sure you have seven, eight, and nine, make sure your seven, eight, or nine are better than anybody else's. So we don't have that big of a drop. You've got to try to win in the margin somewhere. So that was the thought process.

That's what they're trying to do here.

So if you can't have the top-end talent, at least make sure the back-end talent there isn't a fall of the cliff.

They can't do Makar and Taves. So they're trying to do our seven through eight because we're going to have to do that because of the playoffs. Because of the playoffs. Yes, exactly. I'm trying to reason with you because somebody doesn't think this is a reasonable conversation.

Here's what I want to throw out there. When we started the playoffs last year in this very studio, Jesse said that the Vegas Goldenights are mid.

They're mid at everything. Which was the best thing ever. And you said it at the time. I was complimenting them by calling them mid.

Maybe Brad heard that and was like, Jesse's got a point. How about we get a bunch of mid guys to play mid-hockey? And a couple of the mid guys will go down. We'll have a couple more mid guys jump in.

And by mid, I mean, they can run all four lines. They can run all 3D pairings because they're all good. They're all good. No real standout stars. They They have the high-end talent and Eichel and Marsha Stone and all of them, but you'd say that they're a complete team. So what Bradstree Living's idea here is that he's going to build a complete decor that can, no matter who's in, they'll have a certain floor for the playoffs. And Steve does not like that. And he's mumbling to himself. What is it? Anybody listening can't see you mumbling to yourself. Sorry.

What I said is if the playoffs started today, the Leifs would be playing Florida. What a waste of time.

On NCAA free agents, when the Leifs acquired Connor Duhre at the trade deadline, they sent Marley's forward, Dimitri of Chinikoff, back to the wild, along with a 2026 pick. That was by design. Of Chinikoff didn't end up moving. He was immediately loaned back to the Marlies. But by shifting his contract to Minnesota and their reserve list, the Leaps now have two available slots to sign other players before the end of the season. Trio Living has been scouting the NCAA and confirmed he has interest in a few college free agents eligible to sign for teams once their seasons end. I like that.

I like that little nugget.

So that's interesting. So Cade Webber has said... Cade Webber, by the way, was the big 6'8 guy that they acquired from Carolina for a 6th-round pick or something. Sixth, yeah. And he said that the plan is to sign in Toronto. But what I would be interested with with Kade Webber is I don't think he signs before the playoffs. I don't think he signs before the season ends. That's a guy to me that they sign this summer, and they try to go get two NCAA free agents outside of him because you got till August 15th to sign Kade Webber. He wants to be here. They want to sign him. You know that. And you say to him, Listen, we're not putting you in the playoffs this year. You've just won Defensive Defenseman of the Year in the NCAA, which is fantastic. Don't know how much that translates to the NHL, but he's 6'8. Every time he steps on the ice. Oh, yeah. And so that we like that. That's an interesting move. Maybe they do sign Kade Webber. Maybe that is part of the move, and that's their ninth guy. Maybe that's their ninth. We couldn't find the ninth guy.

Maybe that's the ninth guy.

The words were provingProven NHL defenseman.

Okay, not proven. You're right.

He doesn't play the game of professional hockey.

Now, this I thought was interesting, and I agree with this, and I'm going to bring up a different example. On the core, the playoffs, and the lack of success therein. In Treliving's view, his core just needs to keep knocking on the door. I need you to hear this. I look at those Red Wings teams, he said. I talked to Steve Iseman, and he said, At 27, 28, I was the guy who could never win. I won at 30. It was a long time coming. So you've got to keep hammering away. Now, obviously, it's under different circumstances. There is no cap. Detroit was a high spending team even back then. But if you look at Mario Lemu's career, Mario Mario Lemieux was 24 or 25 before he even made the playoffs. Mario Lemieux and the Pittsburgh Penguins were bad. They were bad when he showed up. He was great. They continued to be bad, and they were bad until he was almost Austin Matthews' age. So I agree with that. Now, I don't necessarily agree with all the things that they've done around it, but I agree with that. And then the last one, and this is where it plays into it, on scoring outside of the top four, because what happens in the playoffs, guys, You shut down Marner, you shut down Matthews, you shut down Taveras, you shut down Nylander, the Leaps don't win.

And Brad Treliving watched the Leaps play last year and said, Here's how they got to win. They got to get secondary scoring. And that is why he signed guys like Tyler Bertuzzi and Max Domi, who have both been Very good playoff performers in their careers.

Yep, and have emerged. Bertuzzi was unfathomable to start the season. It was bad. He's emerged. He's officially in there as a secondary score.

So what do we think?

Of?

The quotes, the thought processes.

I really like the NCAA one. I mean, the thought process, I could have told you that. I mean, yeah, you better fucking get production out of Bertuzzi and Domi who you spent eight million dollars.

8 million dollars.

Yeah, a million dollars on.

But the thought process behind it was interesting because I don't know. When you look at last year's playoff roster, who were the least going to get secondary scoring from?

Their completely new line of Achari, O'Reilly, and Niz.

Completely new line. Completely new. So that's interesting. You got guys like Kerfoot, who was paid three and a half million dollars, more than Domi.Overtime.

Winning goal scorer.I know.

But not great on secondary scoring overall.

Generally, no. Right? Right.

And then their fourth line was who?

Well, Envall was in there.Oh.

He was trading.No, he wasn't.No, he wasn't.No, he wasn't.

Their fourth line was a mix of guys. It was Kampf, Aston Ries, Lafferdi, lull. And I know those three were together for at least part of it. Yeah.

And just for reference, O'Reilly had nine points in 11 playoff games.Oh, my God.Man, he was good. Matthew Nies had four and seven. And then you get the drop off of everybody putting up three points.

And this year, they got Connor Duhre.

They showed up in that Tampa series. They did. That was a good series.

It was. They got outplayed. The Leaps got outplayed every game.

Yeah. Yes and no.

I think most games they got outplayed in Sammie B.

I think they were in every game, which is all you got to be. They pulled out for Yeah. Which is all they got to do, which is something they didn't do for two decades.

And they won it. Yes. They won it.

Did any Leap fan give a shit? No.

I'm just saying- That Tampa outplayed them. The deserve to win a meter was rarely in the Leaps' favor. And believe me, I don't give a shit about the deserve to win a meter. And it's interesting. When that first came out, people were like, This is God. And I remember somebody tweeted it at me. I'm like, Well, I'm glad they deserve to win because they didn't. But I'm glad people were like, What's wrong with you? You're stupid. You don't like advanced stats. And I was like, okay. And then a couple of years on, it's nice to see that it's a stats thing. That's nice. Doesn't make me feel better. It's a fun tool. It's a cool tool for sure.

Adam, earlier in the show, about 20 minutes ago, where Where you did the... If we were still back on radio, and this time was a sports show, and you led the top of the hour with, Hey, is this Mitch Marner earning money on his contract? That's the topic there. To add fuel to that, last playoffs, Mitch Marner was second in the team in ice time amongst everybody, so including defensemen. He had 24 minutes and 8 seconds of average ice time.

How many points did he have, Jess?

He had 14 points, which led the team in the playoff.

How many points after the first three games did he have?

I don't have that in front of me.

So when people quote me that stat, Mitch Marner is undoubtedly a very, very-I can tell you. Very important player for the Toronto Maple Leaps in the playoff, and it's something that I want you to watch. Because I've never been certain that the way Mitch Marner plays in the regular season translates to the playoffs. Because when Mitch Marner decides to drive the net, he's actually really good at it. I know. I just don't ever see it enough because he's a pass-first guy. And he could shoot, and he's got all the tools. We all know Mitch Marner is super talented. Jesse, can you give me the readout of his points? Sure.

After the first four games in the Tampa series, so everything Anything beyond that, Mitch Marner had three points.

You're not going to win.

It's curious. You're not going to win. This adds to the conversation of how important Mitch Marner is to the team.

The one game they won.

You're not going to win if he's not scoring.

The one game they won against Florida, Mitch Marner had a goal and an assist. When he struggled and he had three points in, what was that, six games, they lost four of those games. This is what I'm saying. Mitch Marner is very important to this team.

And by the way- Yeah, he better be.

He makes 11 million dollars.

Say in those for Matthews and Neil-Andre and Tavares. But my point in the Mitch Marner conversation is, I actually didn't think he had a great playoff last year. I think he had four good games. Maybe five, four and a half. Listen, man, And I said the same thing against Montreal, and I got a lot of shit for this there, too. Mitch is so vitally important, and he's so talented. What I want to see from him is the stuff that I saw when he was scoring in the Tampa series. And the stuff that I saw was him driving against Florida. I grant you, Florida is a much tougher, physical team, and Matthew Nye got torpedoed and all those things. I get it. But if the Leaps are going to win in the playoffs this year, that player, that player more than anybody else, Neylander produces in the playoffs. We know this. Matthews, except if Phil Deneu is stapled to him, performs in the playoffs. Tavar scores overtime goals to get you to the second round. He's done that twice now for two sorry ass franchise. Sorry ass. I think the road does run through Mitch, and it's more than just what he brings to the penalty kill, which is considerable.

We need Mitch Marner scoring evenly throughout the play.

I think there's something to be said for the game doesn't translate to the playoffs because it's different hockey.

Can I break the conversation down as a cynic? The $11 million player needs to perform.

Yeah. But people will I would say, if you just look at that stat line, it's pretty nice.

Led the team in points during the playoff, a lot of stuff.

But there's more to it than that.

We already have access to... What was the set that was going around? It was him in the first four games of a playoff series versus games five, six, and seven. We have that information. It's terrible. Again, I say this every year. Listen, if they win, holy shit, you did it. Holy shit. You were right. We were all ready to blow it up multiple times, and you frigging did it. Congrats to you and only you, because we have little faith, and you have all the faith, and you did it. They lose in the first round or even second. You have to take a nuclear bomb to this core.

That's enough. And And so, and you're right. I don't think he's bad. The other thing that I love about it- The setup doesn't work. Yeah. And it's not, and again, that doesn't go back to Mitch Marner's fault or Austin Matthews or William Neilland or John Tavares. We're putting too much pressure on four players.

It's the allocation of the money in a salary cap system.

Look at the Winnipeg Jets and what they have done with Blake Wheeler's contract off the books and what they got back for Pierre-Luc Dubois.

And not doubling down on Pierre-Luc Dubois. Yeah.

They got Gabe Velarde, they got Alex Ayafalo. I know that Velarde is out with the enlarged spleen. But when he was in, wow, what a factor. Ayafalo, what a factor. And you're going, so what are the arguments about the Mitch Marder thing? And I bought into this for a long time, and it's not just Mitch, by the way. It's Neil Andrew, it's Niehlander, it's Matthews, everybody. Is, Okay, so you're going to take that $11 million. What are you going to do with it? You don't have that player. You won't have a guy with that skill set. Insert core four member here.

Five more players?

What would you do? And I think that's going back to Steve's point, which is I I have three quarters in this cost of dollar, meaning that when one of those quarters is injured, it makes it very difficult to find two dimes and a nickel to plug that gap. And that's what I'm looking out for in this playoff. And by the way, if you're a leaf fan or an observer at very least, and you think right now that this can't be done, all the evidence in the world supports that. Forget fandom for a second, and I know that's really hard. If you betray the team and go, I don't know if it can work, what evidence would you have that it can in the playoff?

Beyond a lucky guess.

Right? So if it works this year, well, shit, it worked.

I'm not going to hold it against you that you've been wrong every year since 2017. Listen, I want them to win. Dude, I hitched my wagon to this shit. Do you know how tasty that YouTube revenue would be? If the Lefs did the thing, for God's sake, if they lost in four games in the conference final. Do you know what that would do? They win two lousy series and then get pumped. Do you know what that would do? How bad I want that and how bad we need that? I want it to happen. I just You're either asking me to tell you what I think or asking me to lie to you.

I think it's fair to be like, I'm concerned. I think it's fair to be, I'm excited. I think it's fair to say, as a fan, I don't care about the evidence. I'm a fan. Ra, ra, ra, go, Lefs. All that's fair. What I am looking for, objectively as I can, because I'm a Leef fan, is can these guys, and I've seen Matthews do it, and I've seen Neilander do it, and I've seen Tavares do it, I'm looking I'm looking for all four of them to do it throughout. I'm looking for... By the way, Nathan McKinnon. Nathan McKinnon, Colorado Avalanche. If Nathan McKinnon went four out of five games without scoring, are the Avs going to win?

Probably not.

Adam, that doesn't happen to Nathan McKinnon.

Bingo. That's because Nathan McKinnon freaking drives the net because he's a maniac.

At the start of next season, there will be 17 players making double digits. One of those is Kerry Price, so 16. Four of those guys will exist on the Toronto Maple Leaves. Four of the 16. No other team- You're assuming a lot. Has more... I'm assuming they don't blow it up. No other team has more than two guys on their roster making double digits. And that one other team is Florida, who has Bobrowski, who's making double digits. So if you just count skaters, no other team has multiple double-digit players on their team.

Wait, who does Florida have?

They have Barbarowski and Barcoff.

What was his extension again?

$10 million. Oh, okay.

I was like, wait, K'Chuck? No, it's not K'Chuck.

No team in the league has multiple double-digit skaters on their roster, except for the Toronto Maple East. That will change. Who have four.

That will change. That will change. But yes, maybe two is okay. Maybe even three.

Two is unforeseen.

Yeah, we've never seen that. Except for Chicago, when they had it and they didn't win anything.

Cap was lower. I'm talking about next season, right now, contracts on the books. Toronto Middle East got four. No other team has two status.

Here's what I am telling you, and I'm almost guaranteeing it. You don't see a third round this year. That will no longer be the case.

Yeah.

I have three.

I get frustrated because the Internet is the place of permanent opinions. Oh, yeah. And I was bullish. I was like, No, they can do this. They can do this. They're going to be fine. They can and they will, or we can, we will. Fuck, yeah, Kyle. Let's go.

Love that shit. And it was exciting to see something different. They were coming to the table with a different idea, which was previous to the Dave Nonis, which is we're going get all these knuckle draggers and nobody who can score.

But then they, We can and we can and we willed. And I went, oh. And then the world stopped and I went, oh. And then they continued to commit to the four Before they were all making... Dude. I know. Mitch Marner, when his contract expires, is not signing for a dime less than William Neelander.

Well, so let's throw this out. Not a shot in the world. Ryan Pike, who is a reporter for Flames Nation, really good guy, retweeted something today from Frank Cervales. Gary Bettman, don't tune me out. I'm not. Says that the NHL's latest projection... I was doing that. The Arizona Coyotes. Not the Arizona Coyote.

No. Steve, do you see the renderings of the building?

It look good. No, no, no. Don't let them out of the... No.

Don't let it out. There's drawings now for the auction.

Stay, stay, stay.

You want me to send them?

By the way, they're playing in Arizona next year. Anyway, sorry.

I'm not going to send them. I'm not going to send them. Do you want me to send you the drawing? No.

Don't want your stupid macaroni picture.

So Sara Volley's tweet, the original tweet is, Gary Bettman says, The NHL's latest projection for HRR HCR, Hockey-Related Revenue, this season is 6.2 billion.

Give me some.

Ryan Pike, who knows a hell of a lot more about the cap than I do. That's not saying much, though. Sorry, Ryan. Under the quote-unquote lag formula, Because there is a lag to this, because you have to calculate HRR, and then you discover the cap. And remember, usually there's a two-year delta between the HRR being fully calculated and the cap being adjusted.

And they paid off COVID, right?

Oh, my God. They paid it off. They paid it off. Very likely it was paid off mid last season.

But they didn't know. That was Gary's thing. He was like, Well, I can't raise anything because we're not sure if they paid off COVID.

They paid it off probably by this time last season. But they hadn't done the calculation yet. So it's possible the players owed 50 million.

So they withhold money. It was ridiculous.

So under this lag formula, which does exist, how do the players agree to this? That's bad representation. That's how the players agreed to this. Bad representation, bad representation, bad representation. If the cap eventually caught up with this season's HRR, if it were directly comparable, HRR HR is 6.2 billion. Let's say they don't have a lag formula. Sure. What do you think the cap would be?

What is it right now? It's like 87.

I think it's 87.5..

Wait, how many years from now?

Two? No, let's say if it was right now, if all things were equal, 6.2 billion is what the NHL is making in HRR.

93.

Okay, Jesse? 95. 96.8. Caps going up this year. But also, I think it's important that we understand that under Dubas' original plan in '18 and '19, to back your point up, right? The plan was for this time to be around the time that the cap hit $95, $96, $97 million.

It was an interesting bet that is going to follow him for the rest of his career. And it's not fair that he made the bet. It's unfair that he stuck to it.

Because Because COVID happened, salary cap stayed the same, and the lease went, Well, we're not going to change.

Yeah, you got to go, oh, oh, shit.

We should do something about this. Right.

And they did not.

Bingo. Now, also at the NHL GM meetings, because that segues us perfectly, Colin Campbell.

Still employed.

Father of Gregory Campbell, Assistant General Manager of the Florida Panthers. The NHL is proposing six or seven rule changes, according to CJ, and there's a few of them, and I'll bring them up. Colin said, They're not exciting changes. Don't get too excited. Now, Michael Ruso went into some of them, and so did Chris Johnson. Actually, this is a Chris Johnson tweet. He said, With the fuck over glass and friendly fire high-sticking penalties, you'll now be able to challenge them. So if I'm playing on Steve and Jesse's team, and there's a defenseman between us, and my stick goes up, and I hit Steve in the nose, and he's bleeding, and the ref calls a high-sticking on the player between us, let's say it's Jesse who's in between us, and Jesse didn't high stick, Steve, I did, you can challenge it, and you can have that call.

But they can already review that.

But now you can challenge it. That makes sense. Well, if it's a two-minute, you can't review it. It's only when it's a four minute.

Right. But referees these days just call everything four minutes, and then they go review it, and they make the call. Now, they don't have to.

You can't call a four minute if it's no blood, by the way.

No, but they do. So check It's for it. Oh, okay.

Well, now they do it all the time.

They just go look. It's a fucking waste of time. I'm upset.

Sorry. No, my bad. One thing that I think the Leaps will do a very good job of is getting those right. Their video review team In real-time? Crazy. The way they get goalie interference and offside and everything. Crazy. They're really good. They'll be good at that because they have a video team dedicated to this.

What's the bit? Where are you going here?

The bit here is get an eye in the sky team to frigging review these things. Why am I challenging reality?

Do your job. That's the whole thing here is it's a tremendous waste of time to make this a challengeable situation when you could just employ three guys to watch the game and phone down instantaneously and tell the ref in an earpiece, That was over the glass is the penalty. That was not over the glass. Reverse it. You're putting-Just fix it. Get it right. If the idea of the challenge is to get it right, why not just simply get it right? Get it right. And not have it on the coach to play a little game of tic-tac-to with the referee and the video review people to try and maybe get it right or lose a time out or get a penalty or whatever the fuck the penalty is.

This is like the NHL discovering self-checkout. Actually, you're a cashier now. You know what? Actually, you just be the ref. It's fine. You be the ref. You figure it out.

It's a tremendous waste of time. You can just have somebody get it right.

They're not exciting. Watch me, colon.

Here's what's interesting about it, though. And also the fuck over glass penalties can now be challenged, too, which they couldn't before. But what I think is very interesting about this is if you challenge any of these and you're wrong, you're now down five on three. Great. So how many coaches will actually dare to do it? You better trust your video team. So Sheldon can.

That's basically you're being penalized at goal.

Can the video team send Sheldon some tape of Riley Brody together, do you think?

Holy fuck.

This reminds me of paying your taxes and that meme that's gone around where the government's like, We know how much you owe, but you have to tell us. But then if you get it wrong, we're going to penalize you.

You're going to go to prison.

You have the video, too, referees. You know if it's right or wrong. Simply look at it and tell us. Don't Don't put the onus on the coaches to be like, You tell me if you think it's right or wrong. But if you get it wrong, you're in trouble. No, just tell me.

Players will face a penalty if they sit over the boards. Basically, the Ovechkin rule, as Chris Johnson calls it. What is it? Basically, if you can't lean over the boards, you'll get an unsportsmanlike penalty. Because earlier this year, a linesman was caught by a skate plate of a Jets player during a Minnesota-Winnipeg game because you got one leg over and it's around the-I mean, that's reasonable. I think that's reasonable. You can't have a leg over.

It's not a penalty initially. It's a warning and then a penalty. If your foot's over, you won't just automatically get a penalty. They'll warn you. Then after that, if it's once again, then you get a benchmarker.

It's a reasonable rule change, but old habits die hard. That is going to decide a game in overtime.

I think if a guy does it once during the game, that's on him. Old habits do die hard.

There was a suggested adjustment of the accidental on purpose, Matt Murray nature of pushing the nets off their mooring. I'm just going through the highlights because some of these cares. It's so boring, some of it. No, wait. They haven't changed anything, but they're noting it.

There was a game last year where Matt Murray knocked the net off three times. Do you remember who it was against? For some reason, my brain is telling me it was- The Wild, wasn't it?

And then the Wild-It was Minnesota. Was it Michael Ruso who started on it? Yes, it was. I think he's like, this should be the Michael Ruso rule if they had it. That's pretty funny.

But then people were saying, Minnesota is notorious for having that issue. That rule in particular feels like the thing that... I mean, not that anyone would ever cheat, but it just feels easily exploitable.

One of the things that obviously has come up is the use of long term injury reserve, and should be applied in the playoffs? And so there is an executive committee, which is in its second year of general managers, Doug Armstrong, Kevin Shevoldayoff, Steve Iserman, Lou Lamorello, Ken Holland, Dawn Wendell. Those six guys are responsible for a set amount of general managers. It's six guys, 32 team league. They each get their allotted general managers. Bill Daley said it came up for maybe 90 seconds. But what Bettman said is, Listen, if you believe there needs to be changes, then each of you, GM executive, go back to your GMs, try to get some consensus, then bring it to each other, try to see if there is some consensus on what it should be changed to, and then bring it to me. Fair. Which is fair.

I mean, you can't be getting 32 GMs giving you all this different feedback.

Right. Gary Bettman did say that he thinks that it's probably not being abused. I I actually tend to agree with him on that.

It's also something that can't be changed because it's in the CBA. So this is a CBA discussion, even though the GM is like, they'll come up with something and they'll recommend it to the league to then go fight for it with the players in the next CBA negotiation. So it's not like they can just decide something and then change LTIR for next season.

Can I just say, remember Cap Geek?

Oh, yeah.

Gary Bettman said, Well, I don't think fans are that interested in it. Then site came around.

General Fanaiger.

It was called General Fanaiger. And then the Vegas Goldenights hired that guy.

He has a cup ring.

And what have they done since?

And now he has a cup ring, and they are the single greatest team in the NHL at Using the rules. Anyway, don't make fun of people with fun hobbies because they win Stanley Cups.

Note on that. Did you guys see the Calgary Flames recently? Oh, my God. Who tried to sign a player to an ELC, except he's not eligible for an ELC? Because he's 25, right? Because by the time he'll sign, he won't be of age to sign an ELC, and they have to go sign them to a different contract, which is hilarious.

Cj said this happens all the time when we talk to him about it. But what was interesting is the Flames announced it before head office vetted it.

Yep, I think that's hilarious. That is just the Flames. What are you doing?

That's the Flames.

Aren't they also the team? I know it was different people in charge, but weren't the Flames also the team who offer sheeted Ryan O'Reilly? Yes. And they Had a team scooped them up, they would have lost them to waivers, something like that?

Yes.

Top down.

What's the common denominator?

If you don't think that teams are better at running their teams than other teams, it's not true. Oh, of course.

Teams are better at things. Now, there was also the outlined schedule, and we're going to talk the actual games here in a second, too, because there are a couple of notes I just want to make. Bill Daly outlined the schedule for next season's Four Nations Face-off that will feature the US, Canada, Sweden, Finland, Feb 12th to 20th. There will be no All-Star game next year. Actually, I think for the next two or three years. The last NHL games before the Four Nations will be February ninth. The four teams competing will practice Feb 10, 11. Turnament begins on the 12th. The two cities hosting the tournament haven't been finalized yet. They're saying they're close. Here's what I'm going to almost guarantee. It's Montreal and Boston. I'm almost positive on that. Players not competing in the Four Nations will get an eight-day break before resuming practice February 18th. The NHL schedule will resume February 22nd. Should be a really fun tournament.

And they're only skipping the All-Star Game for one year. Oh, I thought the Olympics. The Islanders are hosting it in 2026. Oh, cool. Yeah.

Yeah. Better shave before you go to the All-Star Game, right? But there's- Shave and cut your hair.

Yeah. They awarded them the All-Star Game last month.

So there's going to be an All-Star Game and an Olympics? Yeah. Oh, so next season is going to be long, long.

No, two seasons.

Two Season after. Yeah.

We don't have to worry, but that's two seasons for the next problem. Now, I want to know something very quickly before we go to a press conference here. Do the Vegas Goldenights want to make the playoffs?

No. That's why they got all those people.

Because last night's game was bad.

Oh, yeah?

Well, I don't know if you saw the highlights this morning. I only saw the score because I was doing the LFR video.

I saw that the score was tight. Did it not end tight?

It's just bad goals. Oh, dear. And I know, listen, the Lightning are in a race, too, right? They got their guy.

They went bargain bin shopping. They found a dude who, if he played the full season on the Lightning, would probably have 25, 30 goals.

To Claire.

And Oh, boy. How good will the Lightning have to be for us to have a conversation of, oh, the least might be a wild car team?

Well, I don't know if they're quite there yet.

No, but this is how it starts.

The Lightning scored two in the first, three, and the third. And the Vegas Goldenights scored one each period.

Adam, I think this is a question for you more than Steve. Do you think it's funny how Steven Stamko still doesn't have a contract?

Oh, no, I'm not surprised. They said that he wouldn't get one, and they've not talked to him about it, and that's it. Do I think it's funny? I think it's interesting for the legacy of the Tampa Bay Lightning. But again, on the other side of it, I wish the Toronto Maple Leaves sometimes would not do right by the player, which is what the Lightning are doing. The Lightning are doing right by the Lightning, which, strangely enough, normally, if you make the right call, is doing right by the fans of the Lightning. Which is we'll sit and wait. And if this works, great. We'll retain and we'll retain, and we'll continue, and we'll sign an extension. Everybody's hunking. If there's a problem, and I don't think the Islanders were wanting or expecting to be a wild card team this year, they're looking older, Then maybe they got to get younger.

The doing right by the player thing that we keep bringing up with Dubas. So as a GM, your job is to do right by the team. But him doing right by the player was what he thought was doing right by the team, because I'm going to do He was like, Oh, he's going to get paid by these guys, and it's going to help attract players. Dubas was able to consistently get free agents. But in terms of keeping those players that he did right by, was he ever able to retain any of them? No. He did right by Ilya Mikhaev, by Stan with him in the hospital when he injured his wrist. That came back to him with Ilyam Mikhaev going, You can knock 15 grand off my contract so that we can sign someone. I can't remember who it was before he almost immediately submitted a trade request. It's something that we bring up all the time, but I wanted to mention...

Hockey's a business. It's transactional.

It's part of it. Yeah. I wanted to mention his human reasons and business reasons for doing it and why it also So it didn't work as great as it ought to have.

The Washington Capitals, gentlemen, have two games in hand of the Detroit Red Wings, who currently sit in the second wild card spot.

Who had a great, gritty win last night.

They did against Columbus.

Patrick Kaine is really trying to will that team to the play. He is.

Hey, hey, hey. Lucas Raymond is the star last night.

Yeah, but he didn't get the OT winner, so who cares?

Yeah, boo. His. Tomato, tomato. The Washington The Capitals, gentlemen, have won three straight, and they got two games in hand, and they're one point behind the Detroit Red Wings. The New York Islanders, again, I ask, why can't you simply be good? Their goal-tending has not been good, and that has led to three losses or two losses in a row.

They did not have Pierre Angvall. That's why they lost. They did so?

Yeah. You want to hear Patrick Waal talking about scratching Pierre Angvall? Hell, yeah. Of course, I do. Oh, he scratched Pierre. Healthy scratch Pierre Angvall. Patrick Waal talking about it.

He scratched Pierre Angvall. Just what more do you have to see from him when he's on the ice?

I wasn't too happy about this play lately. Sometimes just have a night off watching the game from upstairs, and he'll probably be back in the lineup against Detroit. But Sometimes it's something that someone needs.

I saw that with other teams.

Kutxouli was healthy scratch in Philly. He's the captain of their team. Pierre needs to understand we need him.

We need him to play a certain way. I mean, I know he's not an over-physical player, but he's capable of giving us a lot more than what he's been doing.

Do we have-Is he? Do we have the front runner for understatement of the year?

I think it's very funny that Patrick Weil mentioned Sean Catturier more than John Torterella did. Yes.

Also-that's a good point.

I said this to Islanders fans in the PR Involve Trade video. 6'5, 215, listed on HockeyDB, and you must go, oh, my God.

Every time he puts on his skate.

Every time he puts on his skates, he's 6'5, 215. His abs has abs. His neck has abs.

His Instagram It's just shirtless Pierre Ingevall. He is so in shapes.

There's this one leaf clip where he's sitting there, shirt off. He knows for sure he's on camera, and he's clapping in the weirdest way because he's flexing the shit out of his biceps.

So that he can check this If someone's getting the belt. I know exactly the video you're talking about.

It's like Nicole Kidman at the Oscars? Yeah.

During a game, the way he shows his toughness, he's the biggest expert at flashing his teeth. And he flashes his teeth at you like a rabbit animal.

But what else does he do to back up the teeth?

Fucking nothing. Absolutely nothing. The most cardio. Fucking Peloton. This dude, I was so surprised when the Islanders went out and got him because I was like, this guy is the antithesis of what this team is trying to be.

But when were you even more surprised?

When was I even more surprised?

When they signed him.

Oh, to the seven years. And not only do we want this, we want it for seven more seasons. Dude, it was my first thought when they signed Patrick Wa. I was like, oh, the Islanders have a bunch of players who he's going to love and Pierre Ingel also. Listen, he made it to the NHL the way he made it to the NHL. He got his long contract. Bless him. He got his come up on the leaves. He gave him a wet fur. He got the game-winning goal, took away two points from them. Good for him. He's 27 at the end of May. He's going to be 28. I don't I don't think he's going to start hitting. I don't think he's just going to randomly one day start hitting.

Does that mean he signed till he's 34 or 35?

He signed forever, dude. Wow. Yeah. I didn't realize he was that old. He's not really a physical player. He should be in the All-Star game every damn year with the body and the skill set that he has.

He does have crazy tools.

But his decision-making is so mystifying on a lot of nights. And there are some players who, when they're struggling, they're like, Well, fine. I'm just going to hit everything in sight, and he won't do it. It's so frustrating.

I don't know how many hits he ever threw, ever, that I can't remember.

I don't know. Patrick Wall is being nice place. He's not. I think that's got to be hockey coach speech. When Steve, you say, That guy's a bad guy. That's the worst thing you could ever say about a player. Patrick Wall saying that Pierre Angville isn't really a physical player. Player is like, Holy cow. He said a player isn't that physical. That means he's zero physical.

And Dubas would never have allowed Keef to say it. No. Because you notice Keef, by the way, is far more chatty this year. You notice that?

Maybe too much so.

He's feeling himself a little bit. He's moved out of the house.

It's almost like his GM told him to button it when it came to criticizing players for four or five years. And now this year, he's like, And You can eat shit. And you can eat shit. It's like that Kevin Hart bit where his mom told him to tell the teacher to mind her business. And then he goes, mind your damn motherfucking business. It's like that. He's gone out there and he's experiencing freedom for the first time as a head coach, and he's lost his mind.

Chris Simon. I want to talk about Chris Simon before we go to the press conference here.

I think we'll have to close there.

Oh, we'll close there. Okay.

Yeah, because we don't have the time. We're running on 145.

Oh, God. Okay. All right. I want to talk about Chris Simon, 52 years old, passed away. If you grew up in my era, you remember Chris Simon? I remember him winning the Cup with the Avs. I remember him, I think, going to the finals with Peter Bondra, Adam Oates, and that Washington Capitals team.

They were so good.

They were so good until they hit Detroit and all their literal All-stars.

No one was beating the '97 Red Wings. No.

That was the '98 because '97 was Philly. In a national Post article on Chris Simon from 2017. This is from Alan Walsh. He has symptoms. This is a quote from the article. He has symptoms of CTE, which are thought to be attributable to significant trauma during his hockey career. A doctor reported that Simon, who was in more than 100 NHL fights, racked up 1,824 penalty minutes and received two of the longest suspensions ever handed out in the NHL, also suffers from depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, and arthritis to his shoulder, hand, knees, back, and neck. And he was also a part of the NHL class action lawsuit against the NHL seeking millions of dollars for its handling of concussions. The reason I bring up that article, because usually, deaths on this show, we're usually a high... We're trying to have some fun, trying to have it easy. But Bill Daly came out today and said that the connection between CTE and traumatic hits to the head and hockey is lacking. It's still lacking, meaning that it's lacking evidence.

Well, that means we need more research. Right. I would like all of the front office people, people with high-ranking positions in NHL, to donate their brains to science. We need more research here. Be a part of the solution. I agree with you. Be a part of the solution.

We know why the NHL does this, but I think what's more important than this is understanding who Chris Simon was to people. Peter Bondra put up a really nice post about him, but actually, somebody messaged me. Her name is Jessica, and I'm just going to leave it at that. And she said this. She said, I'm asking you to bring up Chris Simon because I grew up in Sault Ste. Marie and lived on the same street as Chris Simon when I was a kid. I can barely begin to express what a lovely man he was back then. Just a great fucking guy. I was maybe 10 or 11 at the time, hockey crazy, and he lived right next door to me, right next door to my best friend. Must have been playing for the Greyhounds then. He was so kind to us, always hanging around outside of his house because they would just go to... He's a Greyhound. Oh, my God. He'd go hang out outside of his house. He'd play street hockey with us, and he once brought us out to some French-Canadian sugar pie. So he once brought us out some French Canadian sugar pie that he joked had been baked by Martin Gelina, who I believe was on the team as well.

I don't know why, but I remember that part so distinctly, and I can't imagine it was true, but I do fondly remember the times that we played together. She said, he was a real gem of a human being in real life, and I'd love for people to know more about him. I'm crushed by the loss of Chris Simon. And this is someone who barely knew him. And knew him in the fan sense, which is how we know most of us know these players. I think it's important that when the NHL does this, it's a cold calculation. We don't want to be responsible for this because we don't want to have to pay the lawyer bills or pay out these players. And the NHL, so far, whenever these lawsuits come up as class actions, has done a pretty good job defending them from an NHL perspective, which is we don't have to pay out money. But one day, that is going to change. Gary and Bill are planned for time here because they both know they'll likely be retired when the NHL has got to pay that piper. But at some point, the NHL, the CHL, all of these league are going to have to reckon with this because these guys dying at 52 years of age, and there are other players that I'm not mentioning, but I want to keep the focus on Chris Simon.

This has got to be reckoned with. And I say that as a person who stands up whenever there's a fight in a hockey game. There's a dissonance to it. I realize that's hypocritical of me, but I do think we got to reckon with this sometime. It would really help if the number one sports organization in the world for this game would help it, would help research, would help at least How do we prevent this? How do we diminish this? What Ken Driden said in his book about Steve Montador, you're never going to take headshots fully out of the game. You're never going to take violence out of the game. Probably not ever going to take fighting out of the game. But how do you bring it down? How do you make a headshot be something where people go, Okay, I better not throw this check because I might hit this guy in the head because I could be suspended or this could be a major penalty. That's what we're looking for here. We're not looking for hockey to be less violent, like the violent the violent gentleman, you know who I'm talking about. We're asking for somebody to say, Hey, there's probably a link here, whether or not the evidence suggests it.

Why don't we protect the human beings that make us millions and $6.2 billion in hockey-related revenue? Why don't we just protect them a little bit better? Why don't we take measures to make it a little bit better?

They're not interested.

That's all. I just want to say my piece. And thank you, by the way, Jessica, for writing me because that was really powerful.

Anyway, want to end on something positive?

Yes.

All right. March Madness tournament starts tomorrow. Steve Dangle built a bracket.

I did a great job.

It is a joy Joy to watch you discover that there's a team called Longwood.

Longwood and what was the other one? Morehead.

Morehead and Longwood. And you went in on that, and it was a good time. Adam Wild, what do you think about your bracket?

I'm feeling good. Washington Cougars. They're winning. Washington Cougars. Is that who you picked? Yeah, that's who I had them. That's because both of my cousins went there, and my aunt and my uncle as well. They're all from in the area, so they all went to. And so the cougars are in. So That's what we're going to... I was at my cousin's wedding this year, and they did the cougar's chant at the wedding. They stopped the wedding and did the chant. Listen, it's religion, man.

I had the Wyoming peaches.

I like that. Maddie also did a bracket.

She might make up. That's also what I was getting to. Maddie, you can bring down your mic. Maddie also hopped on and made a March Madness bracket. We have a little group going on Yahoo for our Madness bracket. Some of the other SDPN members are in there. And winner will get coffee from somebody else. Maddie, what do you think about your bracket? How was it being on cam doing that? My debut, finally given the people. You want to look at my face? I'm in there. It's there. I'll drop that link in the description if you want to go watch. The SDP family makes the Lees Madness Bracket. Steve, who knows the Lees Madness Bracket?

He's winning this, right?

Oh, run away. More head, longwood.

Who doesn't?

You know what I mean? Your run through on it was great. Yeah.

I thought so. It's fun. Making it up on the fly. It's beautiful. It's beautiful.

The Steve Dangle podcast.

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